Going Under
by MistressGreyback
Summary: Every morning, he comes to my house; puts coffee by the door and a note. But today, there was no coffee and no note." Gibbs reflects on his relationship with Trent Kort after Trent disappears once more. Oneshot.


Every morning, he comes to my house; puts coffee by the door and a note. But today, there was no coffee and no note. I can't help but wonder where is he? The man I'd spent so long arguing with, fighting with; just suddenly disappeared. He's gone, not even Roper knows where he is.

I can't stand that I don't know where he is, I always know where he is; he sends a message to my phone, he taught me to use it properly. The leather, god I miss it; but that's all gone now. His apartment's empty, his landlord said that he took off in the middle of the night; paid overdue rent and pissed off.

Fucking bastard, he left me; fucking Trent Kort. Fucking Trent, it was a nightmare; but then again, it always is with him. The CIA never keeps their agents around for long, something always happens to them and they disappear. Trust is elusive he said, bullshit; you can't trust anyone but yourself.

Don't want to think about him, I just don't. I stared at the computer monitor, he taught me some things about computers; how to send an e-mail. Even that's failing me, he's not responding – what the hell was I thinking? A fling with a married man, it was an affair; but his wife wouldn't care; she flirts with me a lot. More than normal – Trent put up with it because he knew that when he was away, he'd end up with me.

Trent's gone, he's out of my life now – I can't think about him. Focus damn it, I head-slap myself; I've done it before - when I swapped the evidence. I can hear her, she's on the phone; she's arguing with him, now she's crying. Something about Serenity, and a betrayal; I keep my head down, stay out of the firing line. Women, they shouldn't be allowed as Assistant Director's or Director's; but Roper helped her into that position.

She's the CIA's bitch, she works for Roper still; Kort works for him too. Roper, raper, rape – something Trent said once, sounded like he'd been hurt badly when he was undercover. He told me what happened, he was raped by three men – he'd told Charlie once. She'd spent the next week dreaming of it, it had sent chills down her spine; she'd been stabbed in the spine once. Near her spinal cord, but it didn't turn her into a paraplegic. She nearly died from losing so much blood, but it doesn't matter – Trent's gone, life moves on.

She's storming down the stairs, heads for the stairwell; she never uses the elevator and I don't ask why. Respect, that's the only thing that exists between me and her. There's no trust like there was between me and Trent, I keep silent as she moves past me. But something in her eyes, I glance up at her and she stops; she looks at me, her mascara is ruined; she's been crying, she's tried to remove the mascara but there's still some around her eyes.

"You alright"  
"That was Roper – something's happened, I don't care that you're fucking my husband – but don't even think of getting Serenity involved, she's innocent, got it?"

I barely nod as she moves on, something has happened – she didn't tell me what, and she knows I was sleeping with Trent. She doesn't care because it's me, anyone else and she'd kill them. She knows there's nothing binding between me and Trent, that's why she doesn't care – Serenity? I'd never get the kid involved; the kid's just eight for crying out loud. Vance, he's coming too; but he uses the elevator, it's weird; he's weird, it's all just too fucking weird.

I don't know why I bother to even acknowledge him. He hates me, Charlie's come back; she looks at Vance with tears in her eyes, he leads her to his office. I can hear sobs, I get up from my desk; head for his office. His assistant, Elizabeth, she's gone – no doubt Charlie told her to get lost. Charlie hates having an assistant, Michael; Charlie nearly shot him just for coming in without knocking. I glance through the crack, the door isn't shut properly.

She hugs Leon, clings to him; undisclosed desires? Or is he just a shoulder for her to cry on? I step back from the door, knock once before pulling the door open. Charlie's sitting down near the window now, she's shaking – she's a mess, she can't speak coherently. I can tell her chest hurts, she's clutching the neck of her shirt with one hand as she talks into her phone with the other.

"Anything I can do?" I can hardly talk, I've never seen her cry; never seen Vance like this either. If Jacqui were here, I don't know what she'd do. I approach her slowly; put a hand on her shoulder.

"Get yourself together Ma'am, you're the Assistant Director – you have a job to do."  
"And what would you know, Agent Gibbs?"

She talks through gritted teeth, trying to hold back anger I guess; but she's looking for something else, she wants help. She wants vengeance; I barely nod as she looks at me, she can see it in my eyes. I want vengeance too, I want whoever killed him dead; but vengeance never helps. It didn't help with Shannon and Kelly, didn't help with Kate – I wanted to kill Ari, but Ziva shot him instead. I guess she was protecting me, but now I have to protect her.

Charlie's younger than me, but she's a fighter – she's retaliated to sexism and anything else you can throw at her with an iron heart. She's 32, and now her husband's gone – the only man that she's ever loved. I walk out of the room; the car will be fine in the parking lot. I don't want to drive home, I just want to walk, but something in Charlie's eyes; something spoke out to me. She's just like Trent; she does what she has to in order to get the job done.

Rule three, never be unreachable; but screw the rules, a man died today. The least I can do is pay my respects, I make my way to the Hayes house; their dog, Logan, barks at me; he's in the backyard. Then he goes quiet and whines because he knows that Trent is dead; I know it too. I pull a photo from my pocket, it was the one day I spent with his family; a park somewhere, I can't remember where. Serenity's cuddling Logan, Trent and Charlie sitting and kissing; and Trent's fingers are locked in mine.

I leave it on the doorstep, I can't exactly tell her where I got the photo; I paid a man to take the photo of us, it's the only physical link I have to him. Then again, he did leave his shorts in my basement. Heh, I think I'll keep those, though I think they were mine; can never be too sure whose shorts are whose.


End file.
